At The Resilient Activist we know from our own experience the profound healing and uplift that comes from spending time outdoors.
And lookee here! There’s science to back it up!
This post gives you a smattering of some of the most interesting and promising studies to make the case that you’ll feel better and have a more resilient life if you schedule regular times to travel on that meandering path to into the natural world.
So, in no particular order, we hope you enjoy these articles!
From 1984, this is one of the earliest studies on the benefits of nature and recovery from surgery.
View through a window may influence recovery from surgery (Roger S Ulrich). “Records on recovery after cholecystectomy of patients in a suburban Pennsylvania hospital between 1972 and 1981 were examined to determine whether assignment to a room with a window view of a natural setting might have restorative influences. Twenty-three surgical patients assigned to rooms with windows looking out on a natural scene had shorter postoperative hospital stays, received fewer negative evaluative comments in nurses’ notes, and took fewer potent analgesics than 23 matched patients in similar rooms with windows facing a brick building wall.”
This study demonstrates that four days of immersion in nature, and the corresponding disconnection from multi-media and technology, increases performance on a creativity, problem-solving task by a full 50% in a group of naive hikers.
“Within-group comparisons were used to examine the cardiovascular responses to walking in forest and urban environments. Forty-eight young adult males participated in the two-day field research. Changes in heart rate variability, heart rate, and blood pressure were measured to understand cardiovascular reactivity.”
Results: “Heart rate during forest walking was significantly lower than that in the control. Questionnaire results showed that negative mood states and anxiety levels decreased significantly by forest walking compared with urban walking. ”
“…contact with soil and a specific soil bacteria, Mycobacterium vaccae, triggers the release of serotonin in our brain according to research. Serotonin is a happy chemical, a natural anti-depressant and strengthens the immune system. Lack of serotonin in the brain causes depression. ”